Written on the Skin
by GRINtelligencer
Summary: Yukina ohs and ahs over Kuwabara’s scars and asks what the stories behind them could be. A little romancey, if you squint some. KuwabaraYukina. Oneshot.


**Written on the Skin**

Dane Soar

**Rating:** T, but not too bad, little romance, not my favorite thing to write, but a nice break sometimes.

**Summery: **Yukina ohs and ahs over Kuwabara's scars and asks what the stories behind them could be.

**Characters/Pairings:** Kuwabara/Yukina but lightly

**Comments:** Peroxidepest17 gets the credit for this idea and plot it from one of her drabbles. All those losses would have garnered a lot of scars for Kuwabara wouldn't you think?

**Spoilers: **None really

**Focus: **Scars and memories of

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"Oh my, but you have so many," Yukina murmured, both in awe and a little concern, looking at Kuwabara's chest as she healed the wound on his arm.

"Well, they're souvenirs, I guess," Kuwabara grunts, and squirms a bit when Yukina traces the tip of her finger over a scar on the teen's back.

"What do you mean by souvenirs?"

"Stuff to remind me not to do dumb things again," clarifies Kuwabara, and curses mentally as Yukina looks up at him, clearly confused. "That one you're… ow!…. yeah still kinda hurts a little… anyway that one's supposed to remind me not to turn my back on an angry Hiei. That's how I got this thing on my arm too, I shoulda known better to challenge him." He snorted.

"Hmmm," Yukina murmurs, and presses her fingers to another bit of scar tissue. "What about this one?"

"Oh…um that one… from Urameshi . Reminds me I'm not gonna beat nobody up after I'm dead. Unless I get his deal; course."

Yukina giggled. "That's a good lesson."

She runs her dainty thumb over a longer cut then, that's paper thin and starts on Kuwabara's right shoulder blade, extending all the way to his back with tiny pockmarks on each side of it. "This one is different," she muses aloud. And it is. It looks much more delicate than most of the others, much more precise.

Uttering a snort at that Kuwabara said. "That figures, the bastard always is different."

From the way he says it, Yukina guesses right away, who it's from. "Kurama?"

"Yep. I learned not to underestimate any pretty boys," Kuwabara said, then shifts so that he's laying back against the temple wall, looking at the pretty girl next to him. "Why you so curious about these ugly ol' things anyway, sweetie?"

Yukina finishes her healing and sits next to him, then looks at him and all the other old wounds she can see across his skin. "It's as if you wear you history on your skin." She says quietly, absently, touching her hand to a jagged cut just under Kuwabara's collarbone. "Doesn't it bother you? To always have to see your mistakes?"

He shivers a bit because her touch is always cold, reaches out with one hand to pull her against his chest. She doesn't protest. "Dunno. I'm not much for thinking about the past."

And that's one of the differences about them. Kuwabara took his scars as lessons but tends to forget after a while how much they must have hurt, and the price in blood he'd had to pay to come out with them as just souvenirs. To survive.

Maybe Yukina had been dwelling on her own too long, wondering at their purpose now that she's been free from Tarukane for a while. "Is it that simple?" she asks.

"Yeah, I guess," Kuwabara says, absently stroking the ice maiden's hair. "What's there is there. I haven't got time to worry about them, long as they ain't hurtin'."

"Hmmm," she replies, and supposes that makes sense.

And Kuwabara smiles at her, crooked and full of an honest kind of simple charm that she would have never been able to find in the Makai. "What about you?" He asks.

The ice maiden breaks away to look at her wrists then, at the few small pink scars here and there, wounds to remind her of her time captivity and the cruel talismans Tarukine had use on her.

"They make me remember," she admits, and looks back up at Kuwabara.

Kuwabara is concerned. "Do they still hurt?"

"At times."

"Huh," says Kuwabara, and took her hands in his warming them a little with his warm human touch. "You learn anything from them?"

Yukina frowns at that, looks down again at the pale pink marks.

The one she got on the first week.

Then the third.

And then halfway through the next week, when her captors became truly angry for the first time, frustrated with her disobedience.

And several more under that.

She tries to think about what they all could mean, what she possibly could have learned from that.

Kuwabara's hands hold hers still, the pad of his thumb stroking her hand. Shivering she rests against Kuwabara again.

If his scars are reminders then her are signs of rebellion. Of loyalty and self-sacrifice to stay herself in a horrible place.

They're a declaration, she supposes. That she'll always protect those most important to her, even though they're often stronger than her. And that she'll find her brother. At any costs. Because it's all she _once_ had left. Until she found Kazuma.

Perhaps he was the wrong person to entrust herself so fully to, because one day, he will die and she will live on. But that day is, hopefully, far away.

Kuwabara's rough hand touches her face then, tipping her head up so he can see into her eyes that remind him of someone, but he can never put his finger on it. "Well?"

"I think I learned something," she says then and her eyes had a spark in them that hadn't been in them before.

Another smile from him then. "Well there you go then," he says, and leaves it there.

She laughs at that, eyes twinkling as she gazes up at Kuwabara warmly. "I'll always protect you," she promises suddenly, and he laughs a bit when he hears it, leaning forward to kiss her forehead.

" 'kay then," he says with fondness, pulling her more snuggly against him. "I'll hold you to it."

Yukina sighs comfortably as she's embraced and closes her eyes. "I have something to remind me then," she whispers, trailing her fingers lightly against the ugly scar on his shoulder.

Kuwabara chuckles sleepily, in the happiest place he could be. "Well as long as you learned something."

She smiles. "Yes."

****

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End file.
